Posted Oct 14, 2008, 9:15 AM
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Loving SA 365 days a year
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Join Date: Feb 2007
Location: San Antonio
Posts: 3,898
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{SA} $900 Million Dollar Training Complex Planned for Lackland
This is separate from the 1.8 billion construction boom at FSH for BRAC. Which means, like the article states, some 3 billion in construction is planned.
Quote:
$900 million boost set for Lackland AFB
Launching the Air Force's biggest construction project anywhere over the next six years, Lackland AFB will break ground next spring on a $900 million Airmen Training Complex that underscores the service's long-term commitment to San Antonio.
The dormitory and dining hall complex will go up in stages through 2014, replacing residential areas and cafeterias that in some cases date to the late 1960s.
One commander said the project is not only crucial to training airmen at Lackland — often called the “Gateway to the Air Force” because enlistee training begins here — but important to the city as well.
“San Antonio can feel very good about this investment because we're going to be here to stay,” said Col. Robert LaBrutta, commander of the base's 37th Mission Support Group.
“Lackland Air Force Base is the training capital for the United States Air Force and will continue to be such through this complex.”
The complex is the latest big-ticket military project in San Antonio, after $1.8 billion in base-closure construction on Fort Sam Houston expected through 2011. But unlike work there and at other installations in the city fueled by the 2005 Defense Base Closure and Realignment round, this project will be paid for by military construction funds.
In all, the Pentagon will spend around $3 billion on various projects in the Alamo City in the coming years, as Army and Air Force missions expand because of base closures and wars overseas. Funding has been granted through fiscal year 2010, LaBrutta said, but congressional approval is needed for funding from 2011 to 2014.
Lackland's project will start in May, only months after the base institutes a longer basic training course for new recruits. The training cycle will expand from 6½ to 8½ weeks Nov. 1, spokesman Oscar Balladares said.
The Air Force quietly prepared for the dorm project, mapping plans for phasing in the complex and talking with San Antonio's Military Transformation Task Force as well as local leaders. An item about the project appeared in Lackland's newspaper this year, but spokesman Kirk Frady said the spotlight has fallen on Fort Sam Houston's construction boom.
“Everybody's focus is on Fort Sam Houston,” he said. “The MTTF, the city, the brokers in San Antonio know about it.”
The Air Force will build 20 new structures, including eight 1,200-person training complexes that will be served by four dining halls. Two campuses will be built in phases, with airmen moving into the first dorm as early as 2011, the base reported.
They will replace 1,000-bed Recruiting, Housing & Training facilities built in the 1960s and 1970s. Lackland had renovated those dorms in past years, but a detailed study was done to determine if it made more sense to revamp or replace them, said John Heye, Lackland's deputy civil engineer.
The analysis also took into account security needs that have evolved in the wake of terrorism threats, as well as how the location of dorms could help training, he said.
“All that said, that's where they came to the conclusion we're better off building these campuses, the new structures. It's a better long-term investment putting that all together in one package,” Heye added.
Though no construction contract has been awarded, the project could include reflective roofs, the ability to recycle rainwater and a solar array.
“For us to get to the next level for our training of all the airmen that are going to be coming through, this is certainly significant not only from the perspective of Lackland, but for the United States Air Force,” LaBrutta said.
“In order for us to meet the requirements of our nation in producing the best warrior-airmen, we've got to have a complex and a training facility that can meet that requirement.”
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